Charities
& Welfares

Precious Find On The Doorstep

The first card is a very rare Kraemer card that
seems to show a baby that was left on a doorstep of this home.
The first two groups of cards I thought were perfectly suited
to each other. Orphans and the elderly, the alpha and omega in the cycle of life
both needing the care of others to survive. All of these organizations were started by
people in the various religions of the area, hence their inclusion in this
section.

ORPHANAGES

CHILDREN'S HOME

Not a postcard

The home moved to this site on West Ninth Street in 1878,
where it remained for 40 years. It was founded in the West End in 1864 by Quaker
Murray Shipley who named it the Penn Mission. Due to the Civil War many children
were in dire straits. Shipley was determined to help them regardless of their
social standing or race and he used his own money to open this home.

THE BOYS' HOME OF CINCINNATI

Not a postcard

526 Sycamore St. Center card
shows ad for their magazine.

HOUSE OF REFUGE

Located next door to the City Workhouse in
Camp Washington. This was really one of the early reformatories that opened in 1850, but also included unwanted
children.

or German Orphan
Home
General (German) Protestant
Home

Occupying the block bounded by Highland, Melish,
and Burnet Avenues and Donahue Street., the German Orphans Home was founded in 1849 as the German
General Protestant Orphan Home after a cholera epidemic swept thru Cincinnati
leaving countless children as orphans. The name was changed to Beech Acres in
1950.

St Aloysius Orphan Home 4721 Reading Rd. in Bond
Hill

The St. Aloysius Orphanage was established in 1837
thus becoming the first such institution in the Cincinnati area. The large
central structure seen in the cards above and below surmounted by a dome and
cross replaced the original buildings in 1861. The two story building was added
in 1910 and the Chapel was built in 1922. The card below is mis-named, I
believe, since I can find no information about the orphanage changing its name.
The home was run for 130 years by the Sisters of Notre Dame.
The future for this complex is now in doubt. It is now being run as
a non-profit organization with counselors, therapists, and caseworkers who help
kids with severe mental and behavioral problems and their families. They also
train foster parents, run a school for troubled kids, and operates a temporary
respite home for children with acute psychiatric problems. The problem is the
building is so old it needs major renovations in order to comply with current
school standards.
A major $19.5 million renovation and expansion of the facilities is
expected to be completed by the end of 2012.With this expansion the number of
children it serves will increase from 600 to 800. On September 27, 2012 the
orphanage was added to the National Register of Historic Places.

St. Mary's Orphan
Asylum
(see above)

St. Vincent Home for Boys
Presbyterian
Orphans
Home. Mt.
Auburn

ST. JOSEPH INFANT
ASYLUM

*
Dinner
and
Lunch

The Sisters of Charity of Cincinnati established
the St. Joseph Infant Asylum in 1873 on Reading Road at Tennessee Ave. to serve
as a maternity home for young women as well as a foundling home for infants. It
also included a maternity hospital. According to their archives, in the first
100 years, they had cared for 15,000 babies and 10,000 young women. When the maternity hospital closed in 1954,
the name was changed to St. Joseph Infant and Maternity Home. In 1967 the
facilities moved to Wyscarver Road in Sharonville and added a high school for young women waiting
to give birth so they could continue to earn a degree. In 1990 the name was
changed to St. Joseph Home.

OLD AGE HOMES

THE ALTENHEIM

The Altenheim or German Old Men's Home is located in Avondale
at Burnet and Elland Avenues. (See City Hospital cards)

Dynamite explosion
Annual Spring Festival held at The Altenheim 6/6/26

On March 18, 1907 250 lbs. of dynamite that was
stored next door to the Altenheim on the site of the new General Hospital that
was being built at Burnet and Goodman Avenues. It had been ignited, supposedly,
by a disgruntled employee. The blast heard as far away as Fort Thomas, Kentucky
left a hole 15 feet across and 10 feet deep with splinters from the wooden shed
found embedded in trees a block away. The Altenheim sustained $10,000 in damages
and had to asked for public donations. An estimated 50,000 people came to view
the damage. At the time there was no laws governing the storage of dynamite.

Same image

Organized in 1891 as a home for elderly German men
by many influential Germans living in Cincinnati. As a result of the first World
War the Altenheim's name was changed to the Cincinnati Old Men's Home, and then
later it became the Home for Aged Men. After the building was acquired by the
Children's Hospital in 1966, it was demolished.

METHODIST HOME FOR THE AGED

Laying the cornerstone

Residents

Wilson
Chapel
Art Room
New Residence
Hall

In 1903 publisher Obed J. Wilson donated his
family's summer home in College Hill to the United Methodist Home for the Aged
along with 20 acres and $10,000. The first institution of its kind in Ohio had
burned to the ground in 1902 and needed a new location. The building that temporarily
housed the home in Granville, Ohio, also caught fire so a lot of attention was
made to insure the new building was constructed with fire protection in mind.
Wilson later donated $70,000 more plus building an art gallery into which he
donated his art collection. The Wilson Chapel and Art Room, seen above, are
still part of the home.

5343 Hamilton Ave, College Hill

In 1939 a new, south wing, was constructed giving
it a second tower and thus became known as The Twin Towers seen in the cards
directly above.

Little Sisters of the Poor. Home for Old
Folks
Montgomery
Road
476
Riddle Road in
Clifton